Malaysian Happenings

Well, it seems that it has been forever since I posted last, but really it has only been a week or so. However so much has happened in that time that I really don't even know where to begin. I got in some spectacular diving, and after doing my first dive course alone with three students Jerry had me go to Sipadan to check out what everyone had been talking about. The island was gorgeous, and the waters were even more amazing. The water was crystal clear surrounding the island and reef and then suddenly turned to a dark blue. This was because the reef went from 4 meters (12 feet) and then dropped all the way to 300 (or was it 3000) meters. Whatever the depth was it was deep, and the drop was straight down. This made the diving spectacular. All the diving there was wall dives that were just covered with corals, both soft and hard. There were little creatures all over the walls but then also you had some of the bigger creatures out in the blue. The first dive I did there was amazing, and I was constantly turning around to tell my divers to look there and then here and still I was missing so much. The first dive we saw gray reef sharks and white tip reef sharks. I am not saying we just saw one or two. There must have been 15 or so just on that one dive. Then the turtles. They were everywhere....and in every size. After a while of seeing so many you just got used to them and were saying "yeah...another turtle. So for our surface intervals and lunch breaks we went to the island and it literally was an island paradise. Sweeping white beaches with jungle like trees coming right to the beach. I didn't know at the time but the island has quite a few large (1-2 meter) monitor lizards that roam around. After our break we went on our 2nd dive. This was just as amazing as the first dive if not better. There were just as many sharks and turtles, and also there was a huge school of barracuda numbering about 300 or so fish. They were in a tornado formation and then came sweeping out of it and literally swam 1 meter in front of me. It was just a river of fish that swam by for a solid 3 minutes. There also was a school of jacks that formed a giant shimmering ball of scales. It was so amazing. Also on the dive were tons of garden eels, several large tunas, triggerfish, and then clouds of little pink, blue, yellow, orange, and every other color of little reef fish covering the reef. Needless to say, diving on Sipadan was the reason I had come out to Malaysia.
So not all days were diving on Sipadan and leading around awesome divers. No, that is not why I was there. I was there to instructed, and teaching was what I was doing most the time. After I got through my first three Open Water students I was allowed to go dive on Sipadan and the very next day I was to start another Open Water course with a couple. They wer an amazing couple from Scotland and England. They had been traveling around South East Asia for the last three months and were slowly making there way down to Australia for her brother's wedding. Pretty awesome road trip. They were great students and were a pleasure to teach, very serious and really wanted to learn. It was on this course that I was able to go to some different islands and teach there. I mean there were so many other islands around besides Sibuan and Sipadan.
I ended up going to the islands of Mataking, Tomi Tomi, and also Mantabuan. They were all stunning islands surrounded by crystal blue waters with amazing diving. All these islands were about an hours boat drive away from Semporna and so it was a journey just to get to them. However, it was an interesting drive and you would pass so many different islands and then also just random little developments on stilts in the middle of the ocean. It turns out that these were the sea gypies houses. They were not allowed into Malaysia, but they could live on certain islands and of course the reefs. Mamy of them would build these houses (shacks) on stilts right on top of the reefs and just live there. I mean the closest actual piece of land (maybe a 2 acre island) would maybe be a mile away. It was insane, and to think about living that way was mind boggling. ( I don't think sleep walkers surrive to long in conditions like that.) Yet there were SO many of them that did live like that. I mean there would be so many of these silt houses in one area that you were positive that there was an island there, but then you would drive by and just see that water surrounded them all.
It was also on thes drives that I found out about Russian girls. Okay, so before I start I have to tell you about the stories I had been hearing around the dive shop. Supposedly there was a group of female Russian DiveMasters that were diving with us for some weeks and supposedly some of them were causing some trouble on the boats. I wasn't fully sure what was happening but it didn't sound to good. Anyway, I noticed tht there were two Russians from that grup on the boat and so I was a little leary of them. Anyway, I had just set up all my gear and everything and when I turned around there was a 2 huge sets of knockers in my face. Yeah, I was just a little taken aback and not sure how to respond. We were supposed to make sure that everyone was to wear lifevests and what was I supposed to do. Just casual go over and ask them to put on the lifevests cause obviously their huge boobs weren't going to be enough to keep them afloat? No....I could never do that! Anyway I looked around and everyone was trying to act normal. I mean the few Malaysian boat drivers and helpers could not tear their eyes away, but that was only prbably because they had never seen skin so white. Ha! I just did my best to walk away and act like everything was normal. I set next to the tanks and tried my best to avoid looking in that direction so no one could call me a perv. I was afraid that if I even turned my head slightly in that direction someone would notice and think I was staring. Anyway, unfortunately I had failed to notice tht I sat directly next to their gear and that it was now there turn to set up gear. Before I know it both girls were bent over in front of me digging in the bags for their gear, and boobs were flopping all around. This was all of course on a moving boat so each time the boat hit a wave one of the girls would almost fall into me, and I almost several times was slapped in the face by extra cleavage. I of course looked to the backof the boat and noticed everyone staring at me and trying their hardests not to burst out laughing. It was clearly plain to see my discomfort.
That day I was never so happy to tell everyone to suit up and get their wet suits on. It was so nice to be underwater and no longer stuck on the boat with everyone. However, my uncomfortable moments with the Russian pompamousse fish (Vanuatu secret term for boobs) was not over. One of the girls for some reason decided to get chatty with me and talk to me the entire way back. It was fine at first because she kept her top on. But as we we talking but thattop somehow found a way to come off. You don't know an uncomfortable situation until you are having a normal conversation with someone and they just casually start removing clothes exposing "naughty" bits that truly I have not had much experience with. Haha....I know this sounds sound stupid but I am quite naive and don't have hardly any experience in the ladies department. Also, of course I was sitting in the wrong spot so I couldonly sometimes hear her, so I would always ask "What?" Everytime I asked this she would lean in to yell in my ear and I would find a boob restin against me. I think the first time this happened I jumped and kinda offended her. Okay, so I was not very good at keeping my cool around topless Europeans.
To top that day off, I believe I was was followed to my hotel that night by a prostitute. It was some lady (or a man that wanted to be a lady). And yes, there were many of those Asian men that dressed and acted like women, and at times it was hard to tell the difference. Anyway this one, lets just say person, just followed me and kept asking me if I wanted them to follow me back to my room. I just picked up my pace and tried not to run. It was after this that I started noticing all the hooker dressed women coming into the hotel I was at and just casually walking around the halls of the hotel waiting for something. Ugh.......what kind of place had I gotten myself into.

Home and Malaysia

So I have neglected to write for quite some time. Anyway, I had a few more weeks left in Vanuatu doing the dive instructing and everything before my time was up. The last few weeks were amazing. I had three other instructors to help out so really I didn't have so much to do and practically all I did was lead dives, which I love. We had a few last fun game nights before I left and we had so much fun as also. Gotta hand it to Teneale, she knows how to have fun. Anyway, also I could not have asked for a better last dive in Vanuatu. One of the new instructors was finishing up a open water course and then the rest of us had nothing we had to do, so we only had fun dives. Anyway we overweighted ourselves and then played around on the bottom in a sandy patch. We took off our fins and ran around on the bottom and then played kung fu scuba. It is so much fun......exaggerated moves and tons of kicking and flying around. After a while of that we swam off to explore some of the areas of Twin Bommies that we hadn't been to. We then were starting to get low on air so as we headed back and started to do our safety stops of course a dugong showed up. It hanged out with us and swam around with us. It was great......oh and I forgot to mention that the entire dive was done with all of us wearing Santa hats for Christmas.
So I had spread the rumor that I was leaving Vanuatu and heading straight to the island of Gizo in the Solomon Islands. However, this was not true. It was my original plan but after thinking about it and realizing that I would hate myself for missing a truly amazing Christmas with my family I decided to recant and fly home. I made this decision about 2 and a half weeks before I was leaving. I was nervous about going home without any plans for afterwards but I knew God would be taking care of me. Of course the very next day after telling the people in Gizo I had to back out I got a promising email from one of my first choices for dive shops to work for. After a few emails and everything I had myself a job in the town of Semporna in the Sabah district of Malaysian Borneo. This was the one place I told myself I had to go see before I died so surely the Lord was looking out for me. Also, flights were reasonable so I was still going to be able to go home for Christmas and then fly to Borneo to start working in the new year.
So my flight home was uneventful. I flew to Auckland and had to spend 7 hours in the airport. When I first stepped into the terminal I got quite a shock. For some reason there was this really buff guy in his bright green budgie smugglers (tighty-whities) and then to top it off he was wearing a actual stuffed rams head on his own head. I guess it was to get attention for the shop he was standing in front of and yeah, he sure got the attention. Strange Kiwis. After Auckland, I flew into LAX and after arriving late I realized that I only had 30 minutes before my next plane left. And of course my other plane was on the complete other side of LAX and I had to go through security again. After literally running through the entire airport and waiting in the slowest security line I ran to my gate right as the lady was closing the door. I freaked, but then she looked at my ticket and told me I was on the next plane to Houston anyways and that I still had 30 minutes before I could board. Oops! So after Houston I finally got to Charleston at 11:30 at night and luckily I had an amazing friend kind enough to pick me up at the airport and drop me at home (Thanks Grant, I owe you). So now was the fun part of surprising mom and dad, because yes, they had no idea that I was even thinking of coming home.
So showing up to my house at 12:30 at night I lucked out seeing that the lights were still on and that at least my dad was awake. I went and knocked on the door and stood directly in front on the door so he couldn't see me. He came to the door and yelled “Who is it?” I didn't respond and just knocked again. He kept yelling and each time his voice got louder and slightly more angry (or was it more scared). Anyway I realized he was not going to open up so I popped my head around so he could see. He immediately went silent and his jaw dropped. Then he started yelling “What are YOU doing here?” He kept asking this and for some reason it sounded like he was really mad he was seeing me. I had to ask him to let me in and then he wouldn't quit asking why I was home. Finally he settled down and realized what was going on. Then he told me I had to go wake Mom and let her know. Luckily she had only gone to bed in the last 15 minutes so she was in the state of only being half asleep. He thought it would be best if I went into their room acting like him and just climb into their bed. I did and she hardly moved so I snuggled up to her and put my freezing cold feet on hers. I knew this would get a reaction and she just got mad and told my dad to go put the cat outside. I didn't move and so she told me “Steve, get your feet off of me!” I then told her that I wasn't Steve and all her response was was “Whoever you are get your feet off of me and leave me alone.” It was pretty funny and I just kept telling her I wasn't Steve until the reality of what I was saying clicked. She finally rolled over and looked and realized it was me. She was needless to say, quite surprised.
So anyway I had a few days in Charleston before the rest of the family arrived. I let Sarah know I was home on the phone by answering Mom's phone when she called. Then to surprise Janine I hid in her closet with a hideous mask on and then attacked her when she came into the room. She jumped and then told me to quit because of course she thought it was Dad. I took off the mask and she went straight into waterworks mode. It was quite special. Anyway, Christmas was amazing and I got to meet my two new amazing nephews and managed to spend some great family time with the rest of the nephews and family. We had some fun family game nights playing Mad Gab and there were several hilarious moments with my sisters and mom impersonating Scarlet O'Hare's servant girls. Priceless! Also I stuffed myself with some amazing home cooked Mexican food along with the typical American Christmas feast. So worth going home for. However, my time went way to fast and soon I back at the airport flying halfway around the world again to Malaysia.
I left early in the morning on December 31st and didn't arrive in Malaysia until the mid morning of January 2nd'. Needless to say I was quite jet lagged when I got here. I flew into the town of Tuwau which was about an hours drive from where I needed to be. The dive shop had told me they may be able to pick me up or have a transfer available but I might just have to get a bus there or something. Anyway I walked off the plane as a zombie and everyone noticed. I was instantly mobbed by taxi people and bus people trying to give me a ride and after quickly looking for someone with a sign for me I picked a taxi guy that told me he could take me straight to my new scuba store. I only paid about 18 dollars for hour and 15 minute ride in a 8 seater van all by myself. So really not a bad deal. I arrived at the shop and the people there acted like they had no idea that one of their new instructors named Erik was to arrive today. It kinda worried me a while and after a few calls things were straightened out and they realized that I was supposed to be there. I was treated to lunch and then shown around and then shown the several different living conditions I could have. They were really pushing the living conditions that I had to pay for and it started to worry me about the living situation I was counting on.....the free one. I finally was taken to the free living quarters and they were quite dreadful. My room was a concrete room with no windows, no working lights, no fan, no furniture, with just a broken down mattress thrown on the middle of the dusty floor with a cover on it that looked like it had never been washed. I tried to stay positive and say that I could deal with it. I just really wanted to lay down and sleep for a while but first I had to get the mattress cover clean. Turns out that the washing machine was definitely and infinitely broken. The last straw came when I went to the kitchen for some water and there was none I could drink and then also on the counter was a half eaten whole fried fish that look petrified since it had been sitting out for who knows how long. I told them to please take me to one of the inns and I would pay for a few nights there just so I could get some decent sleep. I went to sleep that night wondering what in the world I had gotten myself into. Nothing was working out how I thought it should have been.
Luckily the next day I was able to tag along with this one instructor doing an Advanced course. He was going to Sibuan island which is the island they do all their course work at. They told me to get used to it because it was going to be my office and that it was truly the worse island to dive on around here. Haha! Was I surprised by that comment when I hit the water. The diving there was incredible I thought and I saw so many things in just the three dives I did there. I saw so many eels, a crazy cool pipefish, three turtles, stone fish, huge lionfish, snake eels, scorpion fish, so many true clownfish, and then huge schools of the most beautiful reef fish. And then I can't even explain all the corals, sponges and other amazing things down there. Anyway, actually before we got to the dive site we had a 40 minute boat ride and about halfway there one of the boat engines dies. They then stopped to check it out, and that of course killed the other motor. So anyway we were just floating out in the middle of the waterway with no way to contact the dive shop or anyone. We managed to flag down a passing boat and we sent one of the boat hands back to the mainland to get a new boat. We ended up just floating around for roughly and hour and a half before a new boat came and we moved onto that boat. We left other people to tend to the broken boat. Of course this had me thinking this was normal and that didn't help me in the area of what I thought I had gotten myself into. So after getting back and everything I was stoked because I had just had three amazing dives. Later that night I was told that I would be starting my teaching the next day with one other instructor. The hook was that we had 6 Russian students doing their Open Water training and none of them spoke English and of course neither one of us instructors spoke Russian. We had one translator that frankly scared me. It was going to be an interesting experience. I did not get that much sleep the night before because I was thinking about everything and truly wondering what I was doing in this position.
The next morning I arrived to the dive shop and was really not sure what to do. I stood around waiting for the other instructor to show and the students. Finally they arrived and then the translator showed up. Anyway her name was Elke, and she was definitely Russian by blood. She stalked (and I mean stalked) up to me and didn't even introduce herself. She just demanded to know my age and of course her demeanor got to me so I lied and told her 23. I had no idea why I did that but that was the first thing to pop out of my mouth. She then demanded to know how long I had been teaching and when I told her 6 months she was clearly not impressed. Ahhh......this was going to be a rough course! I guess I should also describe to you Elke, because then you will see why I was a little intimidated. In a few words she was Heidi on steroids. And the Heidi I mean was the little girl in the Swiss Alps chasing sheep. Elke was a very strong looking girl, that was tall, blond hair pulled back into pigtails and then to make things even more interesting she did not shave her legs or underarms. Then of course she stalked around with a Sasquatch demeanor. Of course, over the course of the day she took a liking to me and decided to try and be friends and when she started asking about any possible girlfriends things went quickly from strange to just awkward. Oh well, she will only be here a week more I think. Hopefully it will pass quickly. So the course went really well and actually we didn't have to translate to much and were able to teach it in sign language. I somehow got stuck with the most nervous unsure diver while Jim (the other instructor) got all the easy good students. Oh well, I seem to be really good with that type of diver. However, after being behind with the skills and getting her (the nervous diver) caught up with the others she decided that she was only a good confident diver when she was holding my hand. That meant the rest of the day when we were underwater she would not let go of my hand. Luckily on the last dive of the day we had made some progress because she let go of my hand for about 10 minutes.
The next day was a little better, and we got all the students through their skills and they actually were pretty good divers.Nothing much exciting or anything. When I got back to the shop that day, I was immediately thrown from one course into my next course. I had to get my three new students through their dive theory and exams. Yay! Luckily though, they did speak English and were somehow able to understand my American dialect. Over the next two days I got them through their course and was able to make three new friends. I am proud to say that they actually became way better divers with my guidance. That is the one thing I love about teaching, seeing the changes you make in someone's diving ability.
So, another interesting thing about this place is the food. There is tons of it around here and it is all strange, interesting and sometimes good. Plus it is super cheap so it is fun to try new things. One of my first meals, I was by myself and I went to this one small restaurant. I sat down and the waiter came over. I didn't know what I wanted so I just asked for some water at the time. She looks at me and asks "chicken or seafood?" I just wanted water at the time but I went with it and ordered seafood. I had obviously ordered my dinner because she walked back to the kitchen. A short time later I had an amazing platter of Asian noodles before me with seafood and vegetables. It was so good, and then it had also come with this really good orange juice that had to have been just squeezed. And all of it was for about 3 dollars. Also along the food subject is the stores. I went into the largest supermarket and got lost in there among all the aisle of strange and interesting things I have never heard of. One thing that really surprised me was the Pringles aisle. They had so many different types of Pringles and some that I never suspected existed. Some of the flavors that comes to mind was the blueberry and hazelnut, shrimp, soft shelled crab (why not just crab?), seaweed, and also something like lemon and sesame seed. I don't think I will try any of those flavors.
Well, this is extremely long, and I am sorry for no pictures. I have yet to get out my camera and it is only because I have been so busy getting settled in. Hopefully things will start to settle and I will finally not feel so much like Alice in Wonderland. I have offically realized that I am no longer anywhere near the United States.

Cruiseboats and Great Days

Cruise boat days can be the worst. Last week was about to do me in but luckily I, along with the help of Leanne and Pete and everyone else at the dive shop, managed to pull through. The morning out was perfectly fine. In fact I thought it was going to be the best cruise boat day yet. However in the afternoon that was a different story. It started off alright, however I knew that that was not going to last. We usually leave the dock at about 1:45 and that day I was supposed to be back at the docks at 4:15. Let me break things down for you. It takes about 25 to 30 minutes to get to the dive site. Then we have to get the certified divers in at one dive site and then move to another to do the intros. This takes 15 minutes or so. Once we are moored up, we get two or three groups of four divers in the water with gear and this can take anywhere from 25 to 40 minutes. Of course on this day it took a good 40 minutes. I then have to account for the 10 minutes to get everyone back on board and then the 30 minutes to get back to the dock. That means I had about 30 to 35 minutes to get through four skills and then a dive. The dive alone takes about 30 minutes and then sometimes the skills can take 5 to 15 minutes depending on if the person is stupid enough to inhale water through their nose. On this day I had stupid divers that took 15 minutes. That meant they had 15 minutes in the water which of course was not going to make them happy.
The site we went to is not my favorite. In fact, I hate it. It is a crappy reef that I always manage to get lost on. However on this day I did not mind and just hopped in the water hoping for all the best. Once my petrified divers were down things went alright. We had a good dive, and when my dive watch hit 25 minutes I knew I needed to find the boat so we could stay on schedule. However, I realized I had no idea where I was and I had no idea where the boat was. I insist that I was to intently focused on my divers making sure that they were not getting in trouble, and therefore I lost my sense of direction. After looking for the mooring for another 10 minutes I decided to surface and swim back to the boat. I knew at this point I would be behind schedule, but there is a small safety margin that I knew would keep me safe. However, destiny had other plans and as I was breaking down gear I noticed thick black smoke coming from the cover of one of the engines. I told George and when he looked smoke came pouring out. Not good. Turns out one of the engines was blown and we could only run on one engine. On top of this we were fighting the current, which ended pushing us into the wrong side of the harbor. By this time I was freaking out because I knew we would not make it, and therefore these cruisers were going to be spending the night in Vila on Nautilus's bill. I could just see my head being chopped off. I called the shop to fill them in and luckily after some intense conversations they decided to send the faster (not broken) fishing boat out to pick up the people and bring them in. Luckily everything worked out, and I only got a small lecture. Of course, turns out that the cruise was not going to be leaving at the time we were told, but a whole hour later, meaning all the stress and rush was not necessary.
This weeks cruise boat was just as interesting, but it went much better. The morning launch went off without a hitch and I was mostly worried about the afternoon one because Leanne was leaving for Oz (Australia) and leaving me in charge of everything. We got everyone on board and left and then I started on getting all the papers correctly filled in. Of course there was one person that had done no paperwork before coming so I had to walk him through it all. As my luck would be, the man was older and from Brazil. He understood not a word of English so I ended up somehow gesturing to him what he needed to put in each box. It was the worst game of charades I have ever played. Then on top of that I decided to fill out what I could for him and he thanked me by placing his arm around me and hugging me. This was no normal hug, for one I was standing up filling out his paperwork, also he refused to release me, and then whenever I tried to shift away from him he grabbed me hard and pulled me closer into the side of him. Of course when I tried to ask him to let me go he didn't understand a thing and instead thought if he pulled me closer he could understand what I was saying. I just ended up blaming the weirdness on the culture differences and tried to think nothing of it. Luckily for me, he was not in my group of intro divers. That was really the only interesting thing that happened on that cruise ship and thankfully we made it back to the dock in time.
Back down underwater not much has been happening. The most interesting thing that has happened recently is that the giant titan triggerfish are breeding and laying eggs. During this time they get very aggressive and territorial and will fight anything that gets in their way. If you have never seen these fish they are really dorky looking. They have big black bug eyes, a big overbite and some of the biggest buck teeth you have ever seen. Whenever I first saw these guys I wondered if their teeth could do some damaged so I Googled it. Turns out they have been known to go after scuba divers and I saw pictures of people that had had their lips literally ripped off by these fish. Not pretty. Anyway I happened to be having a fun dive and I saw a huge one of these fish. For some reason it did not swim away like they normally do and it actually started eyeballing me. I of course took notice and suddenly it turned on me and charged. And I mean FAST. It truly wanted a piece of me. Luckily I reacted fast and flipped my fin up and straight into it's face. This stopped it and it turned away from me and warily watched me. I kept going on my way watching it and it tried to charge me one more time. After that I quickly finned away.
Today was the sort of day that really makes me grateful about where and what I am doing. It started like any normal day, great weather blue skies and tons of sun. We had four people going out with us this morning and luckily I talked the boss into letting us go to Mele Bay, which has reefs that are completely different from what we normally dive on. The first dive was fun, saw some really amazing nudibranchs, a huge painted reef lobster (bone white with neon purple markings), a moray eel, and tons of different fish. The next dive was really neat. For one I didn't lost and have to pop up to see where the boat was (like the previous dive). Then on top of that we saw a huge turtle and also a blue spotted reef ray. Then on this site there are literally fields of sea anemones that cover the sea floor. And all throughout these sea anemones are all sorts of different species of clownfish. It was so amazing to be hovering over all this and have all these clownfish surround you. Pretty special. When we got back we ended up having the afternoon off. I got to chat with my family and also my second family (you know who you are). Then I decided to go to my favorite beach on Erakor and bake and read in the sun. It was a great afternoon and then to top it off I decided to walk to the best Asian food restaurant Pi Ha's (I think that is how you spell it). I had a huge meal for all of 13 dollars (US). Then I found out that they were celebrating their two year anniversary so I got a discount off of that too. My day really couldn't get much better. Hopefully my last few weeks here in Vanuatu will be filled with more days like today.

Diving with Others

Okay, so I just need to write about everything that is going on. I have had several long days back to back and I am just slightly on edge. It has been great to have lots to do and be back in the water after a few days out. However, whenever you are not feeling 100% and having to do everything to get the boat, clients, and everything else ready, it gets to be to much. Also I find it hard to deal with stupid, new, bad, and annoying divers. Luckily, I haven't really let my frustration be shown, and I try to remind myself how grateful I should be and that things could be WAY worse. So please don't think that I am ungrateful or complaining.

Yesterday I started an open water course. Of course he showed up with only two of his knowledge review worksheets filled out, so I had to take the next hour and a half to explain everything and go over the other three worksheets. He was not off on the right foot to becoming my friend. Those worksheets are for you to understand.......I already know that stuff by heart, so please don't make me answer all those questions. Then we hopped in the pool, and he wasn't terrible with all the skills. He had a hard time with mask skills. He was able to do them, but just before completing them, he would quit and shoot to the surface. I was slightly frustrated because he was not telling me what was wrong, or why he was not completing the skills fully. Anyway, we only got through half the stuff we should have because I had to quit early to do a night dive.

I, for one, HATE night dives. I was trying to be optimistic for this one since I was doing a night diving course. It is not the fact that they are done at night, but the fact that I never see anything, and they are a complete pain in the butt to lead and watch after others. Also you get back to the dock late, and then have to clean up everything. They always make for a long day. Anyway, there were no problems with that dive. It was just really boring, and the most I saw was a crab. I could even tell the other divers were disappointed and that made me feel even worse.

Then today I started another open water course. This one was better since they had already done all the knowledge reviews and book work online. All we had to do was go through the pool sessions in the morning. After the pool session, we had a break and then this afternoon we were going out for his (and yesterday's student) first dive. This morning's student also was bringing his 14 year old daughter to do an intro dive, which is the same thing as the first open water dive. Of course once in the water, we had trouble with equalizing and we spent 15 minutes on the descent line. That is never fun, because once down on the seafloor everyone has only half a tank left of air. After 10 minutes of swimming bouancy issues arise, and two of my divers are on the surface. One is the girl and she decides to give up and swim back to the boat. The other was the father and so I take him back down. As I was sorting this out, my other diver somehow forgot about his bouancy so now I was trying to get two new divers back down in open water. Luckily we got back down and we proceeded to continue the dive. Okay, so my biggest peeve with diving has to do with the fact that we are in an OCEAN of water. That means there is tons of room to move, so I don't understand why all my divers have to swim right next to, behind or on top of me. I can't even turn in any directions because then I will run into them. I always feel like a cow being herded in a direction I don't want to go. NOT fun! So after my two divers ran me off my course they decided to not pay attention to my direction and they ended up both going 180 degrees away from me. I decided not to give chase and just watch them to see how long it would take for them to realize they were not following anyone, and were essentially lost. Not nice, but lesson learned. After 4 minutes of wandering like lost sheep I decided to rap on my tank to get their attention and call them back. So yeah, rapping on the tank (no matter how hard) did not get their attention. I was making so much noise that literally all the fish had fled the area I was in. Finally, I saw them realize I was gone, and that something (me) was making a TON of noise. We got back on track and I managed to check their air. After I checked their air once, they became paranoid about me knowing their air pressure. I really couldn't even look at them without them checking their air pressure and telling me. It brought me to the point where I wouldn't even look back to see where they were because I didn't want to know their air pressure. Finally I decided to take them back to the boat and we made it back to the boat and everyone (but me) had smiles on their face. I can't wait to finish both their courses.....I am sure I will have some moments of exasperation.

Okay so now a funny dive story. I was supposed to be diving with these two certified divers on the outside of Pango Point. This dive site is right on the outside of the island and it can get rough so we have to enter the water by doing a giant stride off the front of the boat. It can be a little nerve racking for the new or inexperienced diver. Anyway, my two divers were a couple and he was experience but the lady was new and very nervous. She said that she was going to have problems and that I would have to help her. Of course I did not want to hear this because usually this means that terrible problems can happen. Even worse, this particular site is not forgiving for when problems occur. Anyway, I talked to her and told her exactly how things would happen. We got to the dive site and I decided to get my guys in the water first. I got both of them in (she did a very nice giant stride off the front) and both were feeling better since getting into the water. I hopped in and after checking with them we decided to drop down. The husband was fine and had no problems and went straight down. He did not care about his wife and left her at the surface. She of course was having trouble going down....not because she didn't have enough weights, but because she was afraid to go under. I grabbed her hand and coaxed her down. Her mask just got underwater when she FREAKED. She jerked upwards and spat out her regulator and was fighting to keep her head up. I was slightly uneasy with this and asked her to calm down and tell me what her problem was. Her response was “I couldn't equalize.” I almost started laughing and told her quite condescendingly and sarcastically that “Well......you have to be underwater to equalize.” You should have seen her face when I told her this. She was so shocked I would be so uncaring and she quickly shouted at me to “Shut up!” It was priceless! I put my regulator back in and dropped down. Her only option was to follow. Afterwards she had no problems, and she only had confidence issues so I held her hand through half the dive. After the dive, and back on the boat, I apologized for my sarcasm and she just laughed and told me that was the best thing I could have done. She told me it just showed her how stupid she was being. It turned out that they were a great couple and enjoyed diving with me so much that they signed up to come diving with me the next day. She was still lacking confidence on her last dive, and so her husband went to hold her hand. However, she swam to my side and grabbed my hand. I could tell that he was not happy with this, and even when she let go of my hand, he quickly picked it up and wouldn't let her drop his hand. It was pretty funny.

There really are so many other stories I could tell. Tomorrow we have a busy day with cruise boat people and they always turn out some good stories. I promise to write more often and let you all know what is going on her in Vanuatu.

Stupidity

Okay, so I just looked back and realized how very little I have told you about my amazing experiences here in Vanuatu. I am really mad at myself right now. So much does go on here, and it all just kinda clumps together to form one big memory. I could have sworn that I have related most of the stories that go on but really I have said so little.
Lets see......I shall start with some of the diving stories. Open water diving students are always good at providing a few good stories. My last student was this middle aged lady that was so excited to start diving. She was pretty good in the water but then she forgot some of the basics when trying to complete underwater navigation. We started the exercise on the bottom of the dive site (12m down) and as she started navigating she forgot about her buoyancy and started drifting to the surface. I couldn't stop her and have her drop back down so I just emptied my jacket to make myself as negatively buoyant as possible. I then grabbed onto her BCD and tried to act as a weight. She took no notice, and so here I was hanging upside down underneath my student who was navigating a line. I felt like a remora fish hitching a free ride. My attempt really didn't work to well and we ended the exercise in about 4 meters of water. It then took a good 5 minutes for her to get back down to depth. I am sure it would have been quite amusing to see me curled up in a ball hanging from my students BCD.
Another good story comes from when I was leading two new divers from Asia. They were a bit nervous and not to sure about scuba diving still. We dropped down onto the dive site and started to enjoy ourselves. They stayed quite close to me (to close to where I was kicking them...annoying!) and they started to act a bit more confident. We were coming to the end of the dive and we came around the side of a huge coral head. Underneath at the bottom of the coral head there was a 3 meter leapord shark. It was gorgeous and we were probably less than 2 meters from it. I turned to my students to make sure they saw it (it was VERY hard to miss) and they were just staring at me. I pointed to the shark to show them and they refused to look at it. It was so strange, here I was freaking out because I have always wanted to see one of these sharks and they weren't even going to look at the thing. I wasn't sure they knew what it was so I decided to give them the shark sign. Yeah.....that wasn't the best move. I gave the sign and pointed to it and both of the diver's eyes got huge. I was surprised that niether one of them tried to shoot for the surface. Luckily the shark swam off so my divers calmed down a bit. After the dive on the surface I tried to figure out what they thought it was or what they were thinking, but they were just nonplused and really didn't say much about it. They were some of the strangest divers I have taken diving.
A fun dive that I did happened with a large group. We were doing a drift dive, and I was chosen to lead it since Chelsea refused to lead it (her navigation skills are not to the standard of mine...haha). We had about 7 divers and then the 3 instructors, and I was not excited to have the responsiblity of getting 9 people back to the boat on a drift dive. I was religiously following my compass and feeling good about everything and sudden I hear a frantic tapping on one of the divers tanks. It ended up being Chelsea trying to get attention (like always) and she was pointing to a hige dugong appearing from the right. It was headed straight for one of the divers and he had no idea he was about to have a collision. I quickly got his attention and pointed at the dugong. It was a little late and as he turned his head he got a huge whump on the head from the dugong. His reaction was priceless, as it should be. If I was bumped by a 4 meter animal underwater I would freak just a bit too. Anyway the dugong just joined our group and come up to people to be scratched and socialize. It ended up following us for the majority of the time, which ended up getting me very upset. Of course, everyone was focused on the dugong and had no interest in where I was leading them. They totally disregarded me and refused to follow me. I ended up angerly beating my tank to try to get their attention and of course that didn't help. It was like trying to herd a bunch of cats, it was not happening. Anyway, finally I got Chelseas and Logans help and we managed to cohearse everyone back on track. I ended up getting us directly back to the boat and everyone had an amazing dive. I have to admit that it was one of the top ten dives I have done here.
The other day I had a different kind of dive. Some people might say that I had a 45 minute underwater date with a 46 year old married lady. Haha......yeah anyway she was an intro diver and she was really excited. However as soon as she hit the water that excitment became nervousness. I could tell she was not confident at all and very unsure of everything. We started to swim off and she just blanked out and started drifting to the surface. I grabbed her hand and pulled her down. I could tell as soon as she realized I was down there with her (physical contact) she calmed down a bit. That being I just decided to hold her hand the entire dive. She was fine with that and ended up having one of the best times of her life (her words). At one point of the dive I loosened my grip to see if she would release to dive on her own, but that just made her tighten her grip. Needless to say, after 45 minutes my hand was quite sore and tired. She ended up doing another dive and she luckily had enough confidence to swim on her own for that one. It is times like that, that being an instructor is so rewarding.
I know there are other good diving stories but it is late here and that is all my brain can think of at the moment. I will write more soon, and I will also write about life on land here. It is an amazing place, filled with some amazing people. Though I must admit that I miss all the amazing people back home in the States.

Effects of Port Vila and Friends

I hardly know where to begin. So much has happened in the past three weeks. However in my brain all I can think about is all the diving I have done, and really there is only so much you can say about that. Great, I hope that doesn't make me sound like I am getting bored or spoiled with the diving here. It is great and each dive is always different. I can't say enough good things about it.

So recently we had this real interesting guy, Pete, come stay at the place and dive with us for 10 days. He has had quite the life and has so many experiences and stories that are completely different from any I will ever have. This is mostly because he is a quadriplegic. He had a terrible water skiing accident when he was younger and was paralyzed with limited use of his arms. However, he is an amazing person, and just seeing him live his life like everyone else was really eye opening. He has been scuba diving for quite some time, and in fact he did his 300^th dive while he was here. Of course, things are a bit different for him but that does not stop him. When I first heard about Pete and that he was coming I was slightly nervous. I didn't want to offend him in anyway, and yet I did not want act like I wasn't going to help at all. However, upon meeting him all my nerves were put rest. After learning the drill and figuring out what I could do to help it was quite easy and Pete of course always had remarks or jokes which all had us laughing. It was really great to dive with him and made me appreciate how easy I have it. He also proved that if you love something enough, nothing should stop you.

So we have had several cruise boat days which are always different from the norm. For one we only do two dives during the day, which is nice, and necessary (“beware the Bends”) considering half the time we are racing up and down the water column chasing runaway intro divers. As you can tell these intro divers from the cruises cause a bit of stress, but I always try to look at it as a learning experience. Then you have the ones that go blank once they are on the bottom and you literally have to physically make contact with them to get their attention. Those are also the ones that think they know where they are going and if you don't watch them closely you will soon have a missing diver on your hands. Luckily that has not happened, and that is only because you can easily spot those divers. Another fun category of intro divers that I have encountered are the “handicapped” swimmers. I don't mean physically handicapped, but mentally handicapped. It is for these people that PADI includes a small section about how to swim underwater. Yes, I know that swimming underwater is not hard, and you should see the faces I get when I try to explain it. I have even gotten a few laughs from people when I try to explain. And yes, usually it are these people that look simply stupid trying to swim underwater. For example, there are countless people who have no idea why they are staying on the surface when we are trying to go down. Of course, if these people would stop frantically kicking their fins when they have their head above water they would see they would have no problem going down. Another group of bad swimmers are the dog paddlers. Okay, so they do get around, however they look ridiculous and also they go through a full tank in about 15 minutes. Then you have the ones that get to the bottom and start swimming, only with their bodies pointed slightly up so within 30 kicks they are halfway to the surface, meaning I have to jet upwards to get them to come back down. It is not fun to do this and then have your dive computer freak out and lock you out for the rest of the dive. Another group are the divers that freeze as they go to the descend, so their legs flare out and they end up in a sitting position with their legs straight out. Of course they do not pay attention to where they are and end up sitting on the person's head just below them. This causes a mess, because no one wants a butt or aluminum tank slamming down on top of their head. Okay, so now you probably think that I hate intro dives, which is wrong. There are of course the people I just described but then the majority are perfectly capable divers, who are so much fun to dive with. It takes me back to when I first started diving and each and every fish was something to stare at with awe. It is so much fun to watch these peoples faces light up and actually see smiles behind those obnoxious regulators. One of the coolest intro dives I did happened the other week. I had three people, one guy and then a brother and sister, and they were pretty good underwater. What was neat was that as we were heading to the boat I looked behind to check on them. Instead of my three divers I had two huge white behemoths rocket past me. No they weren't fat, underwater streakers, but huge dugongs. There was two of them and they ended up hanging around us for a while. What was great was the reaction from the other divers. They freaked! I must admit that when I first saw them they scared me a bit.......not too much fun to realize that you are not the biggest fish in the sea, so yes my bladder might have failed me for a second.

Anyway, whenever we are not diving we are either cleaning (rarely), exploring, or resting up. The evenings can be quite fun. Unfortunately for me, we concocted a new drink that is dangerously good. We get a bottle of vodka and place 5 vanilla beans in it and allow it to sit for a few days. Then we mix it with dry ginger ale and man, is it good. Everyone here at the shop knows that I am a lightweight when it comes to drinking and also that I rarely drank before I got here. They of course thought it was so great how I got slightly buzzed after 2 or 3 drinks. However, I never go overboard and I definitely know when to stop and have no problem doing so. Usually on Thursday nights we have the most fun. We invite all our friends (3 people) to come join us at the shop and enjoy drinks and a mean game of cards. We have had some violent games of bullsh**, presidents and a**holes, and spoons. The other night was quite fun because we taught Leanne (the boss) bullsh** and she had quite a bit of fun with that game. Luckily for us our neighbors are pretty far away and so the obscenities screamed at the top of our lungs did not bug them. Let me just say that these crazy nights are far and few between and if any photos appear from them don't think I am toasted, just a little looser than normal.

Well, I could talk about everything else around here that goes on, but then I would have nothing to blog about in the future. I also should say that I am starting to look for my next place so I will let everyone know about anything that might come up.

Times of Diving

So I really can't believe that I am on my fourth week of being in Vanuatu. That is so crazy to me. I am still getting used to things here, especially since it is so much more laid back than Croatia. Not laid back in a bad way where the diving is unsafe. It is just a much warmer, fun environment. I feel guilty if I ever say that this is my work. So there are three instructors working here, including me, then we have the two bosses, Leanne works with the scuba stuff and Pete runs the fishing charters. Then we have several different Ni-Vanuatu staff that do an amazing job at making things so much easier for us. There is George who often skippers the boat, Jim who skippers and also works as a DM, then we have Wendy who cleans up after us (she does our laundry!) and makes amazing cakes, there are several others too that fill tanks, do maintenance around here, and run the fishing boats. It really is a great group of people around here. It took a while to get used to their sense of humor (if you can call it that) and also all the dynamic personalities. The first week I just sat around trying to take it all in, not take offense to anything, and try to blend in. It was pretty obvious though, that I was the newbie from America that really wasn't used to the Aussie and Kiwi ways.
So most every day we are diving, in the morning we have two dives and in the afternoon we have one. We finish up most of the time around 5 or so and then have the rest of the day to ourselves. We trade of days cooking for the group so sometimes we have to get right onto making dinner. After dinner we might go to the movies at the outdoor cafe, or we might just play a mean game of cards. There are slight variations of how the days go, it all depends on if you have students, intro students, or just certified divers. We get a good mix of everything so you never get bored. Also Wednesdays are when the cruise ship comes in, and we only cater to the cruise ship on that day. We get to sleep in on these days, and we only do one dive in the morning and one in the afternoon.
The diving here is amazing. You have such a great variety of dive sites. We have wrecks with good visibility, wrecks with wreck quality vis., plane wrecks, reefs, bommies, a cavern, and just about everything else. The sea life here is astounding too. Coming from the barren Adriatic sea, this is like the Sea of Eden. Life is everywhere it seems, and I have such a hard time focusing on one thing. I swear that my head is constantly swiveling everywhere trying to take in everything. I think I am just starting to get used to it, but hopefully this is not a sign that I am getting bored of it. That would be terrible. Most of the life here is small, the biggest things I have seen here are turtles, a ray from far away, and cuttlefish that might be as long as my forearm. I have to say that the cuttlefish are my favorite animals. They are amazing and really fearless. Plus if you get real close you can see their skin constantly changing color. It is really spectacular. I love the look of new divers faces when you show them a cuttlefish. It is as if they have found an alien, and I must say that that is a good description of a cuttlefish.....very alienlike. Had you asked me what my favorite animal would be a week ago I might have said the "friendly" clownfish, but one dive quickly changed that. So of course groups of clownfish live in anemones, and they are very protective of their babies. These babies are tiny and to really see them you have to get close to the anemone. Often times when you get to close the adults come out and swim in front of your face and chase your hand. It seems all harmless and fun, but really they are trying to chase you off. Most divers just think they are curious. Anyway, on this one dive I had one intro student and I was showing her the clownfish and there little babies. There was one adult that did not like me and kept biting my regulator. Just as I was turning away to leave I felt something slam against my forehead and rip out a chunk of hair. I of course screamed into my regulator and looked to see this clownfish retreat back to his anemone with a lock of hair in it's mouth. I looked at my intro student so see if she had see this and she was laughing her head off. I have to admit it was quite funny.
So really that has been my only run in with the sea life. I have seen some amazing things, and I even got to swim with dugongs. Those things are amazing. Also just the other day I ran into a sea snake and actually petted it. It didn't seem to mind and now I can saw I played with one of the most poisonous snakes in the world.
So also with the diving, I am still learning the different dive sites and how to navigate around them. I am fine with just about all of them except for this one area with three of our sites. The place is called Konanda, and it consists of a wreck, reef and wall. It should be easy, and I can do the wreck just fine. However, going from the wreck to reef, staying of the reef, and finding the boat is not very easy for me. I always get turned around, and I think I have only been able to find the boat 2 or 3 times out of the 6 or 7 times I have been on it. Not good, and much to my embarrassment. I think it is just that the reef looks much the same and also I just found out that the wall doesn't run parallel to the main island. So hopefully, I will be able to get around it next time. I also finally got to do the dive on Star of Russia which is a old clipper ship that was made by the same company that made the Titanic. It is a gorgeous wooden ship that is the picturesque wreck dive. It lies in about 36 metres of water and so the bottom time is quite short. One of the best parts is "falling" to the bottom and flying through the schools of batfish that swirl around the mooring line. There is nothing like it. Another wreck I got to do that was neat was the airplane wreck of the Tasmine. It lies at about 40 metres and is covered in silt. It is a little eerie to dive to that depth and have this plane loom out of the gloom. To make it spookier, there are hardly any signs of life on it. Maybe a few fish that lurk in the shadows. Also since I have been here I have only done 2 night dives. The first one I was just tagging along and the second one I was actually leading. The night dives are fun cause you do see lots of different things, but I just think it is not worth the stress and everything else. When I was leading I did start freaking out because I had no idea where I was and my compass was just spinning aimlessly around. Luckily, I realized (thank the Lord) that I was going in the opposite direction that I should be and after backtracking I found myself directly under the boat. I had never been so relieved. That dive though we saw 4 turtles (amazing) and also some crazy looking slipper lobsters.
Back on land though, we do get some time off so I have been able to explore. My first day off I went to a small island called Hideaway Island. It is home to the only underwater working post office, and if I was fun I would have sent postcards from it. However, I did not feel like snorkeling out there and was lazy and just laid on the beach. I paid for my laziness by getting burned badly. Luckily it turned brown over the next two days but then my skin started peeling. Not pretty.......but I guess it could have been worse. On my next day off I went to a different island resort called Erakor. That island is gorgeous with some amazing beaches. I marched to the end of the island and had a small 12 metre beach all to myself. I did not see a single person that whole day. All I did was bake in the sun and read my book. It was a perfect day. I got to go back there recently with Chelsea, and we hit up the market beforehand and packed a small picnic. That was such a good idea, and we had a really nice afternoon relaxing on the beach. It is times like this that I have to remind myself that I am not on vacation and that I am actually working in such a amazing place.
So I have lots more to talk about but I will save it for later and hopefully I will not wait so long to blog again. Will is going to be leaving us in another week and a half and we will be getting two new instructors that Chelsea and I will have to train. Should be fun and I am sure I will have some stories to tell.